I. Field
The present disclosure relates generally to communication, and more specifically to techniques for supporting location services (LCS) for terminals.
II. Background
It is often desirable, and sometimes necessary, to know the location of a terminal, e.g., a cellular phone. The terms “location” and “position” are synonymous and are used interchangeably herein. For example, an LCS client may desire to know the location of the terminal and may communicate with a location center in order to request the location of the terminal. The location center and the terminal may then exchange messages, as necessary, to obtain a location estimate for the terminal. The location center may then return the location estimate to the LCS client.
Various LCS standards have been developed by organizations such as “3rd Generation Partnership Project” (3GPP), “3rd Generation Partnership Project 2” (3GPP2), and Open Mobile Alliance (OMA). These LCS standards allow a terminal to obtain its location or the location of another terminal. These LCS standards also allow an LCS client to request and obtain the location of a target terminal.
The LCS standards generally require support from a home wireless network of a terminal being located and/or a serving wireless network currently serving the terminal. This support is needed in order to (i) interpret and transfer a location request from an LCS client to the serving or home wireless network and (ii) return a location response with a location estimate for the terminal from the serving or home wireless network to the LCS client. This support is also needed to perform positioning for the terminal and/or to assist the terminal make positioning related measurements and perform positioning. Since these LCS standards rely on support from the serving and/or home wireless network, a third party location provider may not be able to provide location services for the terminal unless the serving and/or home wireless network supports location services and there is a business arrangement between the location provider and the serving and/or home wireless network.